September 30, 2024Shaking Hands with the DeadR.G. Evans

“I’ve played music in bands and solo almost all my life, but since retiring from teaching I’ve spent much more time than before playing at wineries, country clubs, and listening rooms all over New Jersey. I’ve dedicated myself to songwriting, too, with two albums already released and a third I’m in the process of recording now. How has music impacted my poetry? I believe the transaction is the other way around. My work as a poet has helped me write lyrics that are tight, image-driven, and (I’m told) very original. I don’t allow myself the easy out of ‘moon/June’ rhymes or other cliched conventions of popular music, and that rises from my belief that a poet—and a songwriter—has a duty to write something that’s never been written before, not something that’s already familiar. Take for example the opening lines of my ‘love’ song ‘Hearts and Minds’: ‘We go together like a weapon and a wound.’ I like to think that my favorite songwriter, the late great Warren Zevon, would approve.”